Wednesday, October 30, 2013

FULL TEXT: (Chicago, Illinois) – Life for Harold Miller this
week took on all the sweetness of the candy he used to mix before he spent four
years in prison for a a crime of which he was falsely accused and convicted – a
crime which in all likelihood was only the figment of a tortured mind.

Before his four-year nightmare began, Miller, who is now 31,
was a chocolate mixer at a candy company. Quiet and unassuming, he lived with
his mother, relaxed after work with his friends and engaged in the usual
activities of any normal Chicagoan.

~ RIDING A BUS ~

One fall night in 1951, Miller was riding on a bus, unaware
that a woman passenger was pointing him out to her husband as the man who had
raped her four nights before. When he left the bus he was trailed by the
husband of Mrs. Barbara Latimore, while she rushed to call the police.

Arrested, Miller was accused of having accosted Mrs.
Latimore in a vacant lot, dragging her to the rear porch of a house at 3429 S.
Indiana ave., and attacking her.

The testimony of free friends – who took lie detector tests
– that the accused man had been with them at the time of the alleged rape bore
little weight with the police.

Miller was brought to trial, and on May 2, 1952 was sent to
prison.

~ HAD FAITH IN HIM ~

But there were people who believed in his innocence. Jim
McGuire, Sun-Times Reporter; Roy Woods, Miller’s stepfather, Charles Lieman,
his attorney; and Ken Doughty of the Civil Liberties committee worked
tirelessly to clear him.

McGuire died, but the others persevered. They found that
Mrs. Latimore was a chronic schizophrenic, who was capable making even the most
fantastic lies sound plausible. Two years after the after the alleged attack
she was committed to Manento [State Hospital] for a series of shock treatments.

She was released conditionally in Feb. 1954, and her
discharge became permanent one year later.

~ NEW TRIAL PLEA ~

On November 10, armed the information about Mrs. Latimore’s
mental condition, and with the fact that a medical examination had failed to
substantiate the claim of rape, Liebman asked Judge A. Sbarbaro, who had
sentenced Miller, for a new trial.

Judge A. Sbarbaro refused the request and Liebmanappealed to the Illinois Supreme
Court, which ordered a new trial.

Last week, three psychiatrists and a psychologist explained
to Judge Sharboro the mental delusions under which Mrs. Latimore was suffering
at the time of the accusation and pointed out that Miller had been convicted on
her testimony alone.

~ AN INJUSTICE ~

Judge Sbarbaro said he would hold a new trial and declared
that the conviction had been “an injustice to the individual and to the
community.”

Miller would not have to endure the ordeal of the new trial,
because Assistant States Prosecutor Francis Riley said the state will not
re-open the case.

With tears in his eyes, Miller thanked the people who had
worked to free him – all that is, except Jim McGuire. But Mrs. McGuire knew how
her husband would have felt. She said:

~JIM NOT PRESENT ~

“It is wonderful. I am sad to think that Jim was not
present, but I feel that he won from the grave. This is the third man he had
gotten out of prison.”

As for Miller, he has no ill-feeling toward anybody. He
summoned up his ordeal this way:

“I believe that God and trusted Him all the way. At times,
when everything seemed hopeless, I lost faith, but each time it was quickly
restored.”

Harold Miller was the unfortunate victim of a sad
miscarriage of justice. Back home with his mother at 7325 South Parkway, he is
adjusting himself to the fact that the future holds more for him than the
prospect of life in prison.

He does not know if he will go back to making candy, but of
one thing he is certain – life itself had never been so sweet.

The indictment against Mr. Goldman, who was convicted last
fall on Mrs. Hancock’s charges and as a result faced a possible ten years in
Sing Sing, was dismissed last Tuesday, by Judge Samuel S. Leibowitz, of Kings County
Court, who at the same time ordered Mrs. Hancock held in $25,000 on a perjury
charge.

Mr. Goldman was freed by Judge Leibowitz after a lie
detector test given two months after his conviction because new evidence uncovered
during the trial raised doubts about his guilt in the minds of both his guilt
in the minds of both Judge Leibowitz and the prosecutor, Assistant District
Attorney John E. Cone.

The indictment handed up yesterday by the grand jury said
that Mrs. Hancock stated under oath at the trial that “while the attempted
attack took place she screamed and hollered for twenty minutes, while in fact
she did not.” The indictment added that Mrs. Hancock stated under oath at the
trial that “while the attempted attack took place she screamed and hollered for
twenty minutes, while in fact she did not.” The indictment added that Mrs.
Hancock also stated under oath that she did not know Murray Goldman until the
day of the alleged attempt, July 1, 1943, while she actually met him in May and
at the time rode about town with him in the subway and in an automobile.

According to Mrs. Hancock the attempted attack took place at
the nurses’ home in the Brooklyn Hospital, 681 Clarkson Avenue, Brooklyn, where
she was employed.

Mrs. Hancock, who is being held in the Women’s House of
Detention in Manhattan, was in court yesterday to hear the indictment read. Her
lawyer, Vincent O’Connor, asked that pleading be postponed until Monday. Judge Leibowitz
again fixed bail at $25,000.

Mr. O’Connor later told reporters that Mrs. Hancock had sent
a telegram to her husband, William Clark Hancock, a Seabee, stationed in
Dansfield, R. I., asking him to try to get leave to come to New York for the
trial.

A perjury conviction could bring five years in prison on a
$25,000 fine.

FULL TEXT: An assistant District Attorney conscientiously
switched from public prosecutor to public defender and won vindication
yesterday for two teen-age boys falsely accused of attempted rape. They had
been released from jail ten days ago after five months imprisonment awaiting
trial.

In studying the case against them, based solely on the
testimony of the alleged victim – a fifty-one-year-old woman – the prosecutor
came to the conclusion that parts of her story “did not fit.”

After thorough investigation. Mr. Andreoli came into General
Sessions with new evidence yesterday showing that the woman, Mrs. Mary Gillen,
of 44 W. 86th St., had been intoxicated and “had imagined it all
happened.”

As a result, Judge Harold A. Stevens dismissed the charges
against the boys, praised Mr. Andreoli for “excellent work in the highest
tradition of the District Attorney’s office” and tongue-lashed Mrs. Gillen for
“one of the most reprehensible things that the court has experienced.”

The boys, both unemployed restaurant workers, were arrested
at 2:10 a. m., June 25 in Central Park near W. 88th St., when police
found Mrs. Gillen “almost naked” lying on a path near them. Mrs. Gillen charged
that they accosted her, forced her into the park at knife-point, tore off her
clothes and attempted to rape her.

~ Lodged in the Tombs ~

The boys were locked up in default of $10,000 bail each and
were lodged in the Tombs waiting trial, scheduled for next week. Mr. Andreoli
began working on the case and questioned all concerned.

He obtained from police records the name of a man who had
been strolling on Central Park West at the time of the alleged rape. He was
John J. Brady, of 58 North Lansing St., Albany.

With the co-operation of Albany police, Mr. Andreoli had Mr.
Brady returned to the city. He questioned him and later had the witness confront
Mrs. Gillen. Mr. Brady, the prosecutor said, told him that he was helping a
crippled woman that morning when Mr. Gillen, whom he described as being drunk,
approached him and tried to kiss him. Mr. Brady said he pushed the woman away
and watched her “stagger toward the two kids.”

~ Admits Visiting Bars ~

Mr. Adreoli said he then questioned Mrs. Gillen, who
admitted she had visited several bars that night and that “her recollection was
not too good.” She admitted that Mr. Brady looked “familiar” and then,
according to Mr. Andreoli, “admitted that the story she told police was what
she imagined had happened as she could not see why she should be in the park
with these two boys.”

As a result of his findings, Mr. Andreoli moved on Nov. 30
for parole of the two boys pending of the two boys pending completion of his
investigation. Judge Stevens acceded and asserted he did not wish the youths to
“spend another minute injail” if they were innocent.

“When we find an official who not only accept the
allegations but, when some occasions arise which create a doubt in his mind he
uses all the facilities and resources at his command to ascertain the truth, we
feel that he is deserving of the highest commendation, and we do so commend
you.”

FULL TEXT: Mineola – A woman and her pregnant daughter
yesterday admitted plotting to frame a youth on a phony rape charge after he
had refused to marry the girl.

Police said the two hatched the plan after an argument with
the 19-year-old East Meadow truck driver and his parents on Sunday. The girl,
20-year-[old] Joan A. Carvella and her mother, Catherine, then drove to a
police station and filed a charge of first-degree rape – a charge later denied
by the youth, Police uncovered the plot when the women’s stories failed to
check out.

“I guess we didn’t think about what were doing. We acted too
fast,” Mrs. Carvella, 39, said yesterday after she and the girl pleaded guilty
to filing a false report and entering into a conspiracy. Both charges are
misdemeanors.

The intended victim of the mother-daughter conspiracy,
William Porter of 1852 Cole Dr., East Meadow, was unaware that the women had
gone to police until informed last night by Newsday. “I’m shocked. I don’t know
what to think,” he said. “I met her about four months ago and went out with her
a few times. My friends said they heard she liked me. and then she used to
follow me around. Nut I wasn’t interested. I haven’t seen her in the past 10
weeks.”

Porter denied being the father of the girl’s unborn child.
“Out of the blue, the gal came to my home Sunday morning and told me she was
pregnant. She spoke to me and my father and wanted to know what we were going
to do about it. I said I had nothing to so with it and after about 15 minutes
she left. On Sunday night, the girl, her mother and some relatives came over
and started all over again,” he said. But, he said, he resisted all demands to
marry Jean.

The mother and the daughter, who live at 32 George Ave.,
Hicksville, cooked up a plan as they drove home from the Porter house. After
making up their story, they drove to the Second Precinct at about 10:30 PM and
saw Det. Andrew Heberer. They told him that Porter had taken John out on their
first date Saturday night. On the way home, the Carvellas said, he stopped
along Division Ave., Levittown, and forced Joan to submit to him.

Heberer said the women’s statements appeared to contain
inconsistencies. Among other things, the girl said she had not threatened with
any weapon. She said she did not scream and suffered no bruises. After about
three hours, Heberer said, the mother and the daughter broke down and admitted
they had decided to file the rape charge to get even with the youth and his
family.

Both women stood stiffly in First District Court yesterday
and each spoke bthe word “no” when asked if she wanted an attorney and the word
“guilty” when asked for a plea. Judge Edwin R. Lynde released both in $500 bail
to await a probation report and sentencing Sept. 22.

Saturday, October 26, 2013

FULL TEXT: Pueblo, Col., Mar. 1. – The suit of Mrs. Sarah
Prather against Frank Prather for absolute divorce was thrown out of court this
morning when it was found that contrary to the laws she had married Prather
only three months after obtaining a divorce from her previous husband.

Up to this time the suit had developed considerable warmth
and interest. Mrs. Prather had secured her husband under false pretense. She had
not told him that she had been married three times previously and that
therefore he was only No. 4. The couple were made one Aug. 3, 1901. Husband no.
3, whose name was T. Crudgington had been dropped only three months earlier,
unknown to Prather. What the dates of the previous marriages and divorces were
he has not yet discovered.

~ Thrashed Husbands. ~

The story of the conjugal bliss previous to the filing of
the suit is a sad one. Prather says that his wife was tyrannical and cruel. He
is physically a small man and has never enjoyed good health. The wife is, on
the other hand, big, handsome and strong. She has also two daughters of good
physique. Singly and together he claims, that they would beat him. Sometimes
they did it because he had no money to give them, at other times just for the
mere pleasure of it. Two months ago they put him out of doors after midnight
and he had to seek shelter to keep from freezing. He claims to have been always
patient, to have never lost his temper, and after getting the worst possible
thrashing he would only gently remonstrate. Last summer Mrs. Prather opened a
restaurant. This was the beginning of the end.She soon fell into the habit, says the husband, of bringing the male waiters
home with her, right into the home he had himself bought, and to show them
preference. In his own presence she made love to them.* when he remonstrated,
and he always did so gently, she alleges, she would forcibly eject him.

~ Spent Night Elsewhere. ~

But one night when she returned after midnight with a man
the long-suffering worm turned. Prather lost his temper and became violent. He
insisted that she would have to give up the company of other men entirely. The
wife, still accompanied by the waiter, thereupon left the house and spent the
night elsewhere. The following morning she swore out a complaint against her
husband for creating a row and had him brought before the police court, where
he was fined because he would not expose his shame and defend himself.

***

* Note: The phase “make love,” at this time, referred to
flirting and other verbally or physically affectionate behavior, to
intercourse.

FULL TEXT: Los Angeles, Oct. 22. – For twenty-eight years of
married life of William and Luella Stuart was tranquil. Then they began to
quarrel, according to a divorce suit filed here by Stuart, their troubles
culminating them, according to Stuart, his wife ran off with his artificial
leg.

Stuart gave chase, but when he caught up with his wife, she
beat him on the head with the wooden limb and then tried to garrote him with a
cord.